DEEPER: A Contemporary Romance by Jorja Tabu Read online

  Yeah, just like that. He rolled his eyes. Get real, Danny, he thought.

  He could offer to give her a tour of the grounds here. He knew she’d like that. In the interview she’d given the local historical society in the paper, she’d stated explicit interest in the Goodtree plantation, and really, who would be surprised about that. The black debutantes in the Goodtree family were famously denied access to their legacy by the white side, which just hadn’t seemed to notice the last fifty years of racial adjustment in Monterray county. Everybody knew Govenor Goodtree, descended from the oldest family in the state, had acknowledged their legitimacy on his deathbed. And everybody also knew Cranwell Goodtree, the youngest white descendent—youngest, orneriest, and cruelest—expected a pay-out from the sale of the property and didn’t give a damn for sharing. Not in kindergarten, not now. The remaining two relatives young enough to give a damn about what happened to the old place conveniently happened to be black, and that meant he didn’t have to. At least, in a court of law.

  For ordinary folks, shameful behavior might get them enough hassle locally to do the right thing, but Cranwell didn’t care about that, either.

  Danny knew this intimately because he had slowly and silently been buying the acreage around the old plantation for several years. After building the big Atwell Development down in Raleigh, he thought a plantation property might be ideal for conversion into multiple housing units. Historical, beautiful. Renovate the big house into the community center, with a gym, pool, information office, and display model apartment. No big deal. It was only recently he’d been privy to what he was actually doing when he bought all that property. No big deal, until…

  He’d been sitting at the café, watching the beautiful, honey-brown legs of one Charlotte Goodtree, recent undergraduate at the head of her class, attendee of only the finest prep schools in the state, when the waitress had noticed.

  “You know why she’s back, don’t you?” The woman said. There was a tired, slightly vindictive undertone to her pseudo-question. Danny had been ducking her attention ever since she left her phone number on a check, four weeks ago. He shook his head, sheepish that he’d been caught checking Charlotte out. “She’s a Goodtree. Last of three—all the rest but one are in nursing homes, and white.” She raised an eyebrow at him, cluing him into what she thought about that. Seems she might be friends with Cranwell. “Wants to take the place away from Cran Junior, she does.”

  “Cran Junior?” It was Danny’s turn to quirk an eyebrow at her. “Cranwell Goodtree Junior?”

  “They’s cousins,” the waitress said with a rueful smile. Good old boys. What can you do. “But the law don’t act like it knows, even though everybody else does.”

  “How can he sell the property without their permission?” For a moment, Danny was overwhelmed with resentment—he’d literally spent hundreds of thousands of dollars picking off the old Goodtree estate, and if Cran hadn’t had the right to sell it…Well, even if Danny was rich enough to swallow the loss, he could still be good and pissed about it.

  “Don’t need it,” the waitress said, and shrugged. For a minute, she watched Charlotte sweeping the front walk in front of the building, and her expression softened. “The truth is, he don’t deserve it. The Goodtrees were a fine family, but the only good left is in the girls. ‘Specially that one.” She gave Danny a final, terse nod, and walked away.

  That had sealed the deal on his fascination with Charlotte Goodtree. And, unfortunately, his fate: he’d unknowingly helped her cousin accomplish exactly the thing she wanted so desperately to avoid—the loss of the Goodtree plantation.

  ~~~~~~~

  Charlotte was not in much better shape. Freshly showered and in clean clothes, she sat on the couch in Mandy’s apartment and chewed her lip. Her sister watched her silently.

  For ten seconds.

  “So?” She said, flipping her hands impatiently up in the air. “What happened?”

  “Well,” Charlotte said, slowly wringing the word out, “I did a great vault over the fence, you would’ve liked that.”

  “Okay,” Mandy said, matching her sister’s drawn out cadence in the word. “What then? Is the place haunted? Or is it where Cran Jr. has been secretly hoarding the family fortune—did you find a treasure inside?” She waggled her eyebrows. Charlotte couldn’t keep herself from laughing, and then she became thoughtful.

  “Holy shit,” Mandy said, her eyes growing wide as she took in her sister’s expression. “I was just kidding, Charlie—is there really a treasure in that old place?”

  “No,” Charlotte said, and giggled. “Well, not exactly.”

  “Spill it,” Mandy commanded, and then pointed at her sister. “Oh my god, Cran wasn’t there, was he? Guarding it like a damn dragon or something. My precious. Oh shit, we’ll have to go to court—“

  “—No, no no, calm down,” Charlotte said, laughing again. “It was just the handy-man, the carpenter who was working on the house.”

  “Why is somebody working on the house?” Mandy was distracted for a second before noticing the look on her sister’s face again. “Oh, I see.” She ran towards her more demure sister and tickled her. “The carpenter was the treasure—was he handsome? What is he, a Q home on break, or something? Tall, chocolate and delicious—“

  “Oh my goodness,” Charlie said, grabbing her hands and wriggling away. “He’s white!” She gasped the words while kicking her legs, her sister briefly giving her a break while she considered the words.

  But not for too long. “Tall, vanilla and delicious, then.”

  “Yes!” Charlie kicked her away once more and caught her breath. “Yes, absolutely.” She remembered the afternoon, and a delicate blush crept along her color bones, giving her warm, brown skin a rosy glow. Mandy watched with her mouth agape.

  “You didn’t,” she said, and then began tickling her sister mercilessly again. “You did not fuck a stranger in that creepy old mansion! You! Did! Not!”

  “No!” Charlotte was laughing so hard her eyes watered. “Stop cussing so much!” She kicked out again and got her sister at a disadvantage, finally knocking Mandy off of the couch. “Well,” she finally gasped out, grinning bashfully, “not exactly.”

  “Do tell,” her sister demanded, but Charlotte bit her lip again. “What’s the big deal?” Mandy sat next to her and squeezed her shoulder. “I know any kind of sexual contact is a ginormous event for you, but that’s kind of why a one time thing isn’t a big deal, Charlie. If you got a little crazy with a hot guy, then you finally did what you should’ve been doing in undergrad. What everybody else does in undergrad, by the way.”

  “I was stupid,” Charlotte finally said, feeling a tear teasing its way along the corner of her eye. “I shouldn’t have…I shouldn’t have done anything.”

  “Then why did you?” Mandy looked at her appraisingly. “If I know my sister, she did exactly what she should’ve, because Charlotte Goodtree always knows what’s to be done and how to do it.”

  “Not this time,” Charlie said, and skirted the errant tear away with her fingertip. “Well, anyway, it was fun and I’m definitely not pregnant.” She sighed. Mandy raised her eyebrows and grinned. “And maybe I’m being extra stupid, because he did tell me to call him.”

  “He’s probably hopelessly in love with you, you big goof,” Mandy said, squeezing her again. “Did he give you a number?”

  “Yeah,” Charlie said, sniffing.

  “Then call it!” Mandy looked at her like she was crazy. “What’s all this moping about? Just call him right now!”

  “Isn’t that against the rules or something?” Won’t that make me appear as desperate as I feel? Charlotte’s big brown eyes almost welled with tears again, but she didn’t let them.

  “What rules?” Mandy stood up and found a pillow to throw at her. “I think you’re officially beyond the law now, little lady, what with your trespassing and stranger-seducing. Now, you make the rules. Call him!” Mandy’s confidence was inspiring, even if C
harlotte still felt ridiculous.

  Then she remembered. Amazing. Her heart sagged.

  “Charlie,” Mandy said, her voice full of mock sternness. “Call him. Now. No man in his right mind would look at a hot, crazy afternoon with you and say, nevermind. It’s just not going to happen.”

  “It happens all the time.” Why was she so stupid—so reckless? Charlie was momentarily furious with herself when she remembered her thoughtless lust earlier. “If you could see him, Mandy, he looks like…He looks like Apollo. Seriously. He’s gorgeous. He’s probably done the same thing with a dozen other women and then we all get the nice dinner let-down.”

  “You’re not giving him very much credit,” Mandy snorted, looking at her with disbelief. “Or yourself.” She sat down next to Charlie and patted her leg. “I think you just scared yourself today, Charlie—I think it frightens you half to death to do anything risky, and things that have to do with other people are the riskiest of all. Maybe…Maybe he feels just like you do—insecure, concerned that you have the wrong idea—and he’s actually exactly like you. Obsessed with doing the right thing, dedicated, hard-working, and just a really good person.” She leaned in seriously. “Maybe he’s moping around right now, just like you are, and you’re practically torturing him by not calling.”

  “Why do you always tell people I’m the smart one?” Charlie said softly, her lip trembling.

  “Because I am also the generous one,” Mandy said, chucking her under the chin and throwing the phone on the couch. “Now, if you don’t mind, I also have a date. We should both start getting ready…” She waved her fingers in the air and went into the bathroom to shower.

  Charlie looked at the phone.

  And that is how she and Danny ended up having dinner that night.

  5.

  Danny never had sweaty palms. It was just one of those things—he’d been such a successful carpenter, he fully believed, because of his misleadingly burly—but incredibly steady—hands. Tonight, however, he wouldn’t have tried even the simplest task involving tools. If he could, he would’ve avoided using silverware.

  Charlotte, on the other hand, just felt somewhat numb as she paced the corridor between her bathroom and bedroom. She’d been overwhelmed with relief when he’d answered the phone on the first ring, and sounded positively delighted that he thought they should eat together tonight. Well, Mandy thought so, but Charlie didn’t clarify. Instead, she’d gotten a full glowing ten minutes out of their brief conversation, and then crashed back to reality.

  She was a nerd. A debutante, valedictorian, wears-sundresses-her-mom-picked-out nerd. What was she going to do tonight? She couldn’t distract him in a restaurant full of people with her boobs. And she was absolutely positive he would be distracting enough, with his brilliant eyes and sandy hair and sexy scruff…Well, at least he had to wear a shirt. That was one less thing to make her seem like more of a goober—drooling over his pecs.

  She didn’t let herself dwell on the fact that tonight might be an exhausting exercise in failure anyway, for reasons unrelated to her bookishness. Not that he knew that about her anyway. He probably just thought of her as a fun diversion. Slutty, but fun.

  Uh-oh. Maybe she was dwelling just a little bit.

  By the time Danny rang her doorbell, they were both a bundle of nerves, believing the other thought of them as a promiscuous accident that they had to let down easy.

  Sweaty palms. Expressionless face.

  “Hi,” Danny said, smiling when he saw her in spite of his misgivings. Without knowing it, he immediately alleviated her numbness, the sassy up-turn in the corner of his mouth giving Charlie a flush of happiness. He took a step inside her door.

  “Hi there,” Charlotte said, smiling back. Her skin looked like carmelized sugar under the light, and his heart picked up speed. They stood there staring at each other for a moment.

  “So, this is your place?” Danny looked around a little bit, curious. What would a history buff have in their home?

  “Yes, I just moved here after I finished school. I’m originally from Merriweather.” She didn’t know why he would care that she’d grown up two towns away, or that she’d finished school at all. Maybe she was hoping he would; Mandy’s words returned to the forefront of her mind and she tried to relax and enjoy herself.

  “I’m not from here at all,” he drawled casually, taking a few steps towards her bookshelf. “Came up from Carolina.”

  “I heard you say that,” Charlotte said politely, following him. “What brings you up to Monterray?”

  Your family’s plantation, he thought, and then shook it off. He’d tell her, but not just yet. Please don’t let me lose her just yet—not until he figured out what to do about this mess. He reached out and touched the spine of one of her books, reading the titles to distract himself.

  “Daniel?” He heard Charlotte’s voice behind him, drawing him back.

  “Danny, please,” he said, turning towards her again. His eyes were intensely bright against his tan skin, the unbuttoned white collar setting his color off. He wore crisp khaki pants, clean boots. Charlotte could smell his aftershave, and it took a minute for her heart to settle. She awkwardly held out her hand.

  “My friends all call me Charlie,” she said softly before biting her lip. Daniel’s heart melted. “Nice to meet you, Danny.” She smiled, and a small, nervous laugh escaped her lips.

  Were they friends? She hoped so.

  More than friends, Danny hoped. Maybe there’s a chance.

  “It’s a pleasure, Charlie,” he said, and took her small, fragile hand in his. The rough skin of his palm felt indecent against hers, but he found he couldn’t pull away; instead, he pulled her towards him. “I’m glad you called,” he told her, gently putting his other arm around her waist to gather her to his chest. Just for a second. This wasn’t too intimate, considering their encounter earlier, was it? Her soft curls nestled against his cheek, and he closed his eyes to breath her in before letting her go once more, and taking a step back.

  Charlie felt drunk from the rush of desire that swept over her body when he touched her. The feel of his fingers on her spine had almost made her gasp, but she managed to keep her feelings inside. Surely, he wouldn’t want to hold her if he just thought of her as a casual thing, right? She wished she could ask Mandy.

  But she knew what she’d say: “Charlie, he’s probably crazy about you, you goof. Now go get him.”

  So she would.

  Charlie knew right then and there that it was hopeless to pretend she could shake this off. She was falling for someone—a white carpenter she barely knew doing god-knows-what to her family home—for the first time in her life, and she better make the best of it. No matter what the risk.

  Mandy would approve.

  “We could eat in, if you prefer,” Charlotte said suddenly, before she realized how it sounded. “Oh my gosh—I really meant, we could just eat here, I know the café is the only thing open right now and I really sprung this on you and—“

  “—This is probably the time for me to confess I know a little bit about you,” Danny said, smirking at her with that small, adorable twist in his lip. “I have a feeling what happened this afternoon was…unusual.”

  “Yes.” Charlotte felt immediately relieved, until she realized this might be the beginning of the big let-down. “Oh, no—“

  “—No?” Daniel felt genuinely shocked. Not only had he been a half-hearted piece of ass, but he was one of many?

  “Oh! No-no, that’s not what I meant—I meant, yes, this afternoon was…Extremely out of the ordinary for me.” She flattened her skirt with her hands, looking everywhere but at Daniel. Her movement drew his attention to her slim waist, the fan of her hem to her legs. He snapped out of it.

  “Okay,” he said slowly, sitting on the couch. “I didn’t think Charlotte Goodtree, who this whole town talks about like she’s practically royalty, was prone to…” To what? Making random carpenters’ dirtiest dreams come true?